Story+1981-04-18+Paris,+France

´´Thank you....this is a song, this is called ´Independence Day´....thank you.....I need, I need a little quiet for this song, please, thank you very much....(music starts)....I grew up in this little town, was about ten thousand people....and....my bedroom used to be out over the backyard and every morning I used to watch my old man get up at six am and go out and lay on the cold ground trying to start some 200-dollar car he bought so he could get to work.... and...when I was 15, 16 years old, he wasn´t, he wasn´t much older than I am right now, he´d, he´d gotten married real young and took the responsobilities of being a husband and a father and it seems, as I grew up and I watched him, it seems that the only time he ever got to, got to get out of that town was when he went to World War Two and....it seems that the freedom that he was protecting, in his own life he never got much of it....when I was real young I decided that if I was gonna have to live that way, that I was gonna die....and....but there was no place that you could find out anything, it seemed there was....there was no place you could get any information about how to live a different life than your mother or your father did, ´cause in school I couldn´t get it, I never got it from my friends out on the street and I started listening to the radio and it was just something in the sound of the singers´ voices that I listened to at night that said that there was a better way of living that....that I did not have to live the life that my father lived....and that gets harder and harder every day and ....and it´s such an easy thing to miss because that music always sounded just like, just like noise to my old man....and I remember I wished I could´ve, I wished I could´ve explained to him what it was saying to me....´´
 * 18.04.81 Paris, France, intro to ´´Independence Day´´**

´´Thank you....thanks.....thanks for being so quiet....this is a song by John Fogerty...´´
 * 18.04.81 Paris, France, intro to ´´Who´ll Stop The Rain?´´ (following ´´Independence Day´´)**

´´This song....when I was about 26, we played in Memphis, Tennesee....and....and it was after the show, it was late at night, me and Steve, we got into a car, into a taxi, and we went down to, to where Graceland was....is.....and the gates were all locked up and there was a light on in the, in the house and I said ´Steve....I gotta go and see, see if he´s home´....and....I climbed up over the wall and I jumped down on the other side and I ran up to the frontdoor and I was saying ´Now, what am I gonna say? Is Elvis home? Nah´ (chuckles) and I got to, I got just about to the frontdoor and a guard came out of the woods and told me I, I had to leave so I walked out....but I used to dream about what would´ve happened if, if I´d gotten in or if he´d opened up the door (?) especially after, after he died....I thought for a long time about how somebody that had so much could lose so heavy and.....and this song, this, this song is about....oh, the last time, the last time that I´d seen, I´d seen Elvis in concert, my two favorite songs he sang was, one was called ´How Great Thou Art´ and the other one was, uh, ´American Trilogy´ and it seemed.....and I remember ´cause I, I went hoping to see him, you know, do, do all, do all old stuff, all the rocking stuff, but in the end it seemed like the songs that were closest to him and that he sang with the most heart was a song that was about the land that he grew up in and a song just about the God that he believed in, who I guess he hoped would save his soul...but this song, this is a song about freedom, it´s a song about not, not having to die when you´re old in some factory or about not having to die in some big million-dollar house with, with a lot of, uh, nothing pumping through your veins....´´
 * 18.04.81 Paris, France, intro to ´´This Land Is Your Land´´**

´´That song....that song was....was written as a fighting song because you gotta fight to make that true ´cause it´s just a dream....but, uh....´´
 * 18.04.81 Paris, France, intro to ´´The River´´ (following ´´This Land Is Your Land´´)**

´´This is....you guys ain´t from Texas, are you? no? (chuckles) this is, uh....this is called ´Wreck On The Highway´....sometimes something happens....you see something that makes you appreciate what you got, I guess, uh....I need a little quiet for this one, thank you very much....´´
 * 18.04.81 Paris, France, intro to ´´Wreck On The Highway´´**

´´This is, uh....we´ll do that one in, in a few songs´, alright? (chuckles) but right now, this is from ´Darkness On The Edge Of Town,´ this is called ´Racing In The Street´....´´
 * 18.04.81 Paris, France, intro to ´´Racing In The Street´´**

´´On the piano, Professor Roy Bittan....on the guitar, Steve Van Zandt....on the bass, Garry W.Tallent....on the drums, the Mighty Max Weinberg....on the organ, Phantom Dan Federici ....and last but not least....how can I say it?....let me think.....let me just say king of the world ....master of disaster....the emperor of all things....he´s faster than a speeding bullet....more powerful than a roaring locomotive....able to leap tall women, I mean tall buildings in a single bound....now I don´t care who you bring down here (?) Muhammed Ali, ain´t none of them turkeys can stand to the power and the glory of the Big Man, Clarence Clemons...´´
 * 18.04.81 Paris, France, middle of ´´Rosalita´´**

´´This is, uh....I need a little echo on this....this is a song that, uh....by Elvis Presley that people don´t do too much....´´
 * 18.04.81 Paris, France, intro to ´´Can´t Help Falling In Love With You´´**

´´I wanna, I wanna thank everybody for coming down to the show tonight, thank you very much....and this is our first time here and I just want youse to know that....I can´t, I can´t tell you how we feel about the reception that you´ve given us, thank you.....and thanks, thanks for being so quiet on those slow songs, it means a lot to me, thank you very much....so let´s go, let´s rock all over the world....´´
 * 18.04.81 Paris, France, intro to ´´Rockin´ All Over The World´´**

//Compiled by : Johanna Pirttijärvi//